Textcee
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A textcee, derivative of the word emcee, refers to one who shares his or her rap lyrics on hip hop Web sites and chat rooms as a way to improve and/or receive feedback for rap lyrics he or she may intend to record. Textcees sometimes purchase recording equipment and record their songs, at which point they are called netcees. The style in which these artists type is most often Hip Hop, although they may also construct text in the fashion of performance-ready Spoken Word poetry.
Textcees are not to be confused with scrypt advocates, who use hip hop influences to create visual poetry and literature. Textcees most often are young people using the Internet as a stepping stone to performing and making music.
[edit] History
Textcees have existed on the Internet since 1996. Rudimentary HTML forums dedicated to hip hop culture were created to house textcees so that they may converse about hip hop music and culture, while at the same time, practice their own lyrical ability and content. Chat rooms were even developed to encourage competition in an online form of battle rapping, which is a mainstay in hip hop culture.
Evolution of these boards has given textcees a chance to establish themselves as a notable part of the hip hop community. During the later half of the 90s, some textcees like Anticon[1] were able to create underground buzzes for their independently released music. Also young adults (and teens) can show there lyrical ability,some of the most noteable teen textcee is one named LocoKidd[2] also known as Mars or MarcMyWordz. During the turn of the millennium, there was an explosion of rap/poetry Web sites and forums.
Currently, rap forums such as Hip Hop's Elite, 411Hype, Project Rhyme, RapBattles, Rapmusic, RapVerse and Urban Prowlers lead the front in the collection of boards available for aspiring textcees.
[edit] Terminology
As textceeing, or writing ones lyrics down, is seen by many of its participants as the first step toward recording hip hop tracks, much of the terminology is borrowed from the rap culture.
flow: The flow, or the overall rhythm, of a text piece; a good flow would be one that establishes a consistent rhythm without having unnecessary pauses or breaks (a choppy flow).
Internal/Multi: A multi, or multisyllablic rhyme, is one that is used commonly in textceeing. An internal rhyme is one that appears more than once in a line, rather than simply ending each.
Ex: Bar 1: sick of see-ing ya on wikipedia Bar 2:Equipped with media to flip the seat of ya
punchline, punch, line: Refers to a two line stanza in rap text that is constructed with humour, usually intended to injure the character of an opposing emcee, or to demonstrate ability.
rhyme scheme: Refers to the length of each line in accordance to its following line. A desirable rhyme scheme is one that can be spoken, or 'rapped' outloud to a hip hop instrumental (90-95bpm standardly)
Spit: Refers to vocalization of texted lyrics either to a hip hop oriented instrumental or acapella.
Text: Refers to a textcee's writing.
Topical: A topical is a text piece that is centralized around a singular situation or noun. Usually a topic is posted within the thread of a forum as to challenge textcees in contest.
